Up or Down?
by Morag I
Summary: Has anyone ever wondered if Ellie still sleeps in trees? Well I know there's one particular creature who's dieing to find out.


"Cool!" Crash gasped from the top of Ellie's head. "This place has a tree!"

"Yea, an' it's a big one!" Eddie added. The two possum brother slid down their sister's trunk and scampered up the enormous oak tree they had been referring to. It was truly a massive thing, it's thick branches splayed out wide—covered in healthy green leaves. It's trunk was broad and twisted, covered in knots that were just too tempting not to hop around on. When both brothers were high in the branches, the sounds from a furious (if insane) game of tag floated down to all those on ground level.

Those of which included: Diego, a sinewy saber-toothed tiger with golden brown fur and a red dorsal stripe running the length of his spine.

Sid, a short sloth with dull brown fur and a stripe of darker brown down his back, crazy blue eyes, and crooked front teeth.

Ellie was a slender, rust colored woolly mammoth female with shocking green eyes rimmed with long lashes. A pair of beautifully curved tusks spiraled out of her mouth.

Manfred (or Manny if you wished to keep your head), also a mammoth, but with a broad, stocky frame, chestnut fur, and thick tusks that didn't have as much of a curve as Ellie's and were thicker and more crooked.

The possums in the tree were entirely identical excepted for Crash's light blue eyes and Eddie's brown ones.

This mix-matched herd had been traveling all day long and a good piece of the night in an attempt to find a suitable resting point. They were bone tired and weary. All but the possum twins, who'd been riding on Ellie's head the entire way.

Sid plonked himself down at the base of the ancient tree, his head resting against one of the mighty roots. "I...am...tired..." he moaned to no one in particular.

Diego grunted in agreement, since talking seemed to take too much energy. The saber curled up across from Sid and began grooming the fur on his shoulder.

"Why do you do that, Diego," Sid inquired, looking at the saber with an expression that was probably the beginning of disgust.

"So I don't become a flea ridden, fungus furred, mud-ball like you," he replied coolly, and then went back to his bath.

"But don't you get hairballs?"

"Yeah, he does!" Crash interrupted, hanging down from the tree by his tail. "I saw him cough one up this morning!" Eddie put in, holding his nose. "An' boy do they stink!"

Diego snarled at the possum brothers, barring his bayonet-like canines.

The two just snickered.

"Alright, children," Manny growled, "pack it in an' get some sleep. If you guys keep me awake, I'm gonna' shake the teeth right out of your skulls." The mammoth bull looked up at Crash and Eddie when he said this, remembering the times that their nightly tag games had taken them right over his back and just out of reach of his trunk.

"More like the other way around," Eddie objected, grinning and showing all of his needle-sharp possum teeth.

"No joke! He could bring this tree down with his snoring!" This last comment from Eddie made the twins laugh even harder. However, they both let out petrified yells when Manfred's trunk came dangerously close to swiping them off their branch with his trunk.

The mammoth bull gave an irritated snort as he watched the possums scamper farther up the leafy branches. Shaking his weary head, he trudged to the other side of the tree. Like everyone else, he was dead on his feet. His muscles were spent, his tusks felt heavier than usual, and everything else was sore. Manny was almost sure that his toenails hurt (if that was at all possible). He laid down slowly on a bunch of cushiony moss that grew at the base of the tree. Manfred winced as he bent his right shoulder in. Some nights, the knotted scar it bore would send a shooting pain down his leg. This was one of those nights. Every time it did that it reminded him how he'd received it... Spears were painful weapons despite the puny size of those who made and wielded them.

"Good night everybody," Ellie called as she slowly made her way towards the thickest branch they'd found, her plodding footsteps betraying how weary she was.

"G'night..." mumbled the possum brothers, who were already half asleep in the tree.

"Night," Diego mumbled as he allowed his head to rest on his broad paws and his yellow-green eyes to gently slide closed.

Sid was about to say his "good nights" when he realized that Manny was starring Ellie with unusually keen interest. So he just watched, curious.

Manny's ears were perked forward when he noticed Ellie's choice of sleeping place. "Uh...Ellie..." he called softly.

"Hmm?" she quired, pausing, one front foot on the tree trunk as she turned her head to look at the mammoth bull behind her.

"Are you still gonna'...sleep in a tree?" Manfred's light brown eyes held an odd look. Inquisitive, yet, shy, with a trace of longing in them.

Ellie pondered this for a moment. What was he getting at? She had an idea, if what she read in the bull's eyes were true. "Why do you ask?"

"Well..." Manny began, feeling a bit fidgety now that her attention was fixed on him. He didn't know why, but he always felt self-conscious when she looked at him. "I...I was thinking...maybe you could, um, try...sleeping on the ground for a night." The mammoth bull tapped the ground with the tip of his trunk.

Ellie removed her foot from the tree and turned to face Manny, tilting her head to one side. She allowed the slightest trace of a smile to play across her features. However, her eyes were almost laughing. If she knew Manfred, he was saying something and implying something else.

Noticing her puzzled (though amused) look, Manny started rambling nervously. "Well, if you don't, ah, like it you can always...well I mean you're free to...um well--

"Ellie," Sid cut in, "what my poor, love-struck, mammoth friend really wants is for you to sleep beside him 'cuz he thinks you smell pretty."

'So that's what he's after,' Ellie thought to herself, trying, for Manny's sake, not to laugh.

Crash and Eddie started singing in loud, off key voices. "Wheeeeen...thaaaaaa...moon hits your eye, like a big pizza pie, that's amore! When the world seems to shine, like you've had too much wine, you're in looooooove...!"

Diego barely suppressed a smirk under a paw.

Manny's cheeks turned a brilliant scarlet as he shot murderous glances at Sid.

"Aw, c'mon Manny," he beamed, putting his hands behind his head an leaning against the tree. "you know I'm just speaken' the truth!"

His woolly mammoth friend was about to spit back an icy retort back at the still smiling sloth when he felt something soft wrap around gently around the underside of his jaw. It lured his gaze away from Sid and to a pair of lovely emerald eyes.

"Well why can't he just ask me?" the owner of those eyes asked, a playful grin on her face.

"Uh...um...gah..." was Manny's intelligent answer. He couldn't think, he couldn't form complete sentences, not with those amazing eyes so hear to his own--a dull light brown in contrast.

"That's why," Sid replied with a smug grin, referring to the captivated look on his friend's face.

Ellie paid no heed to the sloth's remark. Instead she just laid down, her warm side pressed against Manny's. "I guess I'll accept your offer," she whispered to the mammoth beside her. She nestled into the soft moss and into Manny's thick fur, so much coarser than her own and darker too (but somehow still cozy). She wondered if all mammoth bull's fur was darker than female's.

After a while, Manny glanced over at Sid and Diego to make sure that the two were sound asleep. Diego was flexing his claws, his lip curling in his slumbers--as though he were dreaming of a hunt. Sid was on his stomach, his back legs scrunched underneath him so that his rump stuck straight in the air, and his thumb was stuck in his mouth. He couldn't see Crash or Eddie, he thought they were sleeping... Oh well.

Before, he'd felt as though he could fall asleep at any moment. But now that Ellie was laying next to him--her fur pressing into his--he was wide awake. He told himself that he shouldn't be nervous, that he should relax...but it wasn't working.

'C'mon, Manfred,' he told himself. 'You shouldn't be this jittery! It's just Ellie...who happens to be one of the single most beautiful things that you've ever laid eyes on-- No! No! Stop it! You're just making this worse!' Manny paused for a moment, trying to think of what to do, what to say, if he should say or do anything at all.

'Breathing might be helpful.' Manfred took a deep breath, trying not to let it rattle nervously in his chest. Then he took another, and another. Each breath he took seemed to help his taught muscles to slack. Manny sighed, lowering his head. Sid hadn't been lying about what the big woolly mammoth thought about Ellie's scent. It did smell pretty--like fresh pine needles and warm moss. And again, weariness came over him. He remembered the day's (and most of the night's, don't forget that part) exertions and that made him feel even more exhausted. Suddenly, all he wanted to do was sleep, to rest his worn-out body.

"Sleepy, big guy?" whispered a quiet voice in his ear.

"Mmm-hmm," was all he managed to say. His eyes were getting heavier by the second and the sweet relaxation of sleep beckoned him. His ears drooped along with his head, until his tusks were the only thing keeping it up. Then he felt something that pleased him to no end. Ellie reached over and entwined her trunk with his, giving it an affectionate squeeze.

Manny smiled ever so slightly, his eyes finally closed, and returned the gesture. He allowed his cheek to rest gently against hers and gave a satisfied sigh when she scooted in closer to him.

"You know," she murmured, about to fall asleep herself, "you have a rather pleasant smell yourself."

But by then, the mammoth bull was deeply asleep, smiling in his dreams.


End file.
